In the Library
by BadgerJessica
Summary: A guest appears in the silence of the library that changes the course of the Doctor's future. There's a paradox making holes in the universe and millions of people are falling through the cracks into non-existence. The Bad Wolf sees all.
1. In the Library

Chapter One:

A/N: A guest appears in the silence of the library that changes the course of the Doctor's future as we all know.

Disclaimer: I do not own Doctor Who. I play with these characters and situations for fun, and I'm pretty sure Moffat and I would have several differences of opinion if I did work for Doctor Who.

Rose stumbled out of the stacks in a flash of gold light. Her propulsion from the Dimension Cannon made her stumble as she tried to slow herself from being thrust into the bookshelf. Once she had righted herself, she looked to her left and glanced at the books. She had entered the wrong section. She was in Children's Books, and had meant to land in Biographies. Her aim was getting more accurate, but she still had a little trouble with detailed locations. She was just glad this was not like the last time where she landed in a pond of giant koi and had to run around Barcelona (the planet, not the city) in a sopping wet leather jacket and boots. Her team thought it was hilarious and after changing and getting tea her own humor returned. She _had_ looked ridiculous. She waited another moment studying the silence for any sign of the party she had followed. Nothing. The biggest, busiest library in the universe was completely empty of sound.

She wandered down the hall watching the shadows with trepidation. She would hate to have blasted into the library, just to end up victim to the Vashta Nerada. She wished she had time to stop and look at the beautiful floors and columns of the library architecture, and the entire universe of books at her fingertips. She wished it had been like before, where they got to save the universe while admiring the scenery, but she had a job to do. She could admire the scenery when she had found her target and gotten justice for the millions who had been killed. She shook herself and strode purposefully through the halls. She stopped occasionally to check her bearings. Entering another circular room she saw a sign that she was on the right track. Or at least here at the correct time. The TARDIS was bathed in sunlight, a celestial star bringing her closer to her goal. She ran a hand over the panel and sighed as it hummed in the back of her head.

"Hey girl, I missed you," Rose said softly. The hum increased in response. Rose smiled sadly and walked away from her.

She walked up a flight of steps and through yet another of the beautiful arches. She looked up into the books to read some of the titles. French literature. A door slid opened along the wall further down from her and she jerked away from the sound in shock.

"Bloody hell, traveling through all of time and space and I jump at a bleeding automatic door," she chastised herself. 

She heard a voice speaking from the open doorway, far enough away to be a murmur, but there was no one else here. No one else in the library, except the group she had been pursuing. It had to be them. As she stepped forward to the hallway the shadows receded and she watched them closely. She was glad to have the utility attached to her belt that repelled the millions of shadow beings. She also trusted the scientists at Torchwood to be halfway decent at their jobs, but she would hate to be eaten before she could complete the mission.

She strode towards the door, her steps muffled. Through the door stepped a young woman, hair up in an eighties style pony tail and blinking stupidly at Rose.

"Who are you?" the girl asked, her voice quavering as she stared at the woman in front of her. Rose figured the girl was ready to run or scream. She was shaking like a leaf and kept glancing over her should through the door.

"A friend. The Vashta Narada, the creatures in the shadows are going to come back in a moment. You should go back inside there with the lights, yeah?"

Rose moved closer to her and the girl backed away, "How can you be here? No one is supposed to be here."

The girl eyed Rose wearily, but Rose just kept smiling at her. Finally, the girl moved towards the door and back into the circular room. Rose followed behind her, stopping just in the shadow of the doorway to survey the room. Everyone's concentration was on the Doctor. Her Doctor, who was sitting on a desk, was arguing with a portly man in a space suit. Donna noticed first. Good Donna, wonderful, brilliant Donna. Rose's mission would protect a lot of people, but she wanted to protect Donna especially. Without breaking eye contact with Rose, Donna stepped forward to his side.

"Doctor…"

"No one knows anything? The people just disappeared, but the message says they were saved."

"DOCTOR!" Donna Noble yelled at him, stepping forward, grabbing his chin and turning it to the direction of Rose. He stopped mid-sentence, his annoyed expression fell from his face. Rose wished she had a camera. The look of utter shock, confusion, and disbelief. Rose smiled sadly at him and moved forward to step into the light.

"I know this is a shock, and you have a million questions running through your head right now, but I have something I need to do," said Rose, resolve set into her face and she pulled her sidearm out and points it at River Song. River's face froze. "Melody Pond aka River Song, you are under arrest for crimes against the Universe under the Shadow Proclamation, Article 234. I am taking you into custody for questioning."

-000-

"What?" The Doctor finally managed to squawk out. "What?"

"I don't know what you think I have done, but if it is for what I think it is for, then you are a little late. I was already arrested for that," said River, staring right back at Rose over the barrel of the gun. Rose shook her head. She knew this was going to be quite the confrontation. She had been following River Song through the universe, having to watch her ingratiate herself to the Doctor in his future forms. She even watched their marriage, and it killed her, but it was all leading to this. This one moment, the first time the Doctor had met her.

"I think you know why I am here, River. And it isn't for killing the Doctor."

River smiled, "Spoilers."

Rose smiled back at her, but kept her gun trained, not even blinking as she watched her adversary. She had to admit, River Song was a beautiful and clever woman. Her obsession with the Doctor was, on the other hand, unhealthy and dangerous-especially for the Doctor.

No one in the room moved or spoke for several moments. Rose continued to stare into Rivers eyes, determination sparking golden behind the hazel depths. She could feel the time vortex bubbling up in her, uncomfortable even being near River. It was worse than being with Jack.

"The Big Bad Wolf," River Song said with a sigh and her shoulders slumped. "My, what big eyes you have." 

"All the better to see the time paradox you created with," Rose said ruthfully. "You have a choice, River Song. You can come with me quietly, or I can hunt you to the depths of the universe. It is your choice."

"I never had a choice."

"I know," sighed Rose, feeling the guilt rise up in her. "I know you were planted, that you had to live this life with him and let yourself get close to him. I know what that did to you, but it is also going to kill the universe. You have already killed thousands with this path."

"I won't make this easy on, you know," said River with a smile and a toss of her head. Rose nodded in understanding. She put her hand to the small headset on her ear before responding.

"I would expect nothing less. Bad Wolf to Command, I have her."

The communication bracelet on her wrist came to life and the familiar voice of Jack Harkness broke the silence of the library.

"Bad Wolf this is Papa Bear," Rose rolled her eyes at the code names. "We have you both. Prepare for Trans-Dimensional jump in five."

"What is going on here?" the portly man stepped forward bristling. "I paid a lot of money for this expedition. And went through great lengths to secure River Song from prison to preserve my family's legacy. I demand to know what you are doing here and what you are going to do with my archeologist!"

"She's under my custody now. She's a war criminal, and we need her to reverse a time paradox and put an end to…a war," Rose explained, trailing off carefully as she felt the Doctor's eyes boring into her. She knew how she must look to him, and it killed her a bit. She wanted to be the same girl who helped him get rid of a werewolf, or had lain in the applegrass of New New York. That was 'Old Rose', she was 'Militant Rose', all leather jackets and combat boots, with two guns, handcuffs, and all sorts of tech hidden on her person. She felt warn and old. Granted, she'd been living this life longer than she had ever imagined she would.

"How did you get in here?" asked Donna. "And who are you?" 

"Oh, right. Sorry, I'm Rose Tyler," responded Rose, but kept her eyes on River's. She was playing light and airy, but her whole body was tense and ready to chase, or fight, River Song until she could get her locked up to be questioned and then charged. Innocent until proven guilty, but Rose had seen all that River had done and knew there was no chance of exoneration for River.

"Rose? As in THE Rose?" asked Donna incredulously. "Wow, this is quite a moment then, isn't it? I thought you were stuck in parallel world somewhere. The space dunce said you wouldn't ever be able to get back here."

"How did you get back?" the Doctor asked finally, cutting off Donna and ignoring everything she had said. "And what are you doing working with Jack?"

"I spent a number of years developing a Dimension Cannon with Pete's Torchwood. Brilliant people, combined with a rift on both sides bubbling over because of the paradox, helped me get them working. My first trip between the worlds, I landed in Torchwood 3 in Cardiff. Ran right through a wall into Jack's lovely arms."

The Doctor snorted derisively. Rose smiled, but she forced herself to keep her eyes on River and not look at the Doctor. She wanted to look at him more than anything. She wanted to look at him, touch him, rush into his arms and immerse herself in him completely, but she knew she could not. She had to wait. She had a job to do and there was nothing for it.

"Bad Wolf, we've got you. Hope you didn't eat a big breakfast, this is going to be a bit bumpy."

Rose felt the pull and the golden light from the dimension teleport as it surrounded her and River. She gambled a glance at the Doctor, "Bye, Doctor. Donna, it will be lovely to meet you."

With a flash of golden light they were gone and the group left in the library could not quite figure out what they had witnessed. The Doctor was frozen in place and trying to get back to the present task of the Vashta Nerada and the missing people in the library as a second shadow appeared, but it was difficult to work on the task at hand. All he could think about was Rose Tyler, River Song, and a time paradox in the future.


	2. Strings of the Universe

Chapter Two:

A/N: We're going backwards now to when Rose's whole back story as the Bad Wolf righting the universe begins. I'm so glad you all like the idea. I've been playing with it for a couple of months now and finally have come up with a pretty decent story line. Thank you very much for reading and reviewing! The updates are going to be sporadic because I'm applying to law school and work sometimes explodes all over everything.

Disclaimer: I do not own Doctor Who. As you can tell. Moffet and I would butt heads at the least.

Threads tie the universe together. Physicists call it string theory. Rose knew it was not a theory, she had seen it. Rose had held the threads of the universe in her hands like a marionette player and she had made them do as she wished for several brief moments, scattering the words throughout time and space to lead herself through life. According to the theory, there are unidentifiable dimensions between the worlds. The void. When she fell through the void her memories had come back from her time with the time vortex. The memories were splintered and incomplete, but she remembered the strings. She also remembered the Doctor's kiss, taking the vortex out of her. The Bad Wolf had used the strings. She had seen this happen, her separation from the Doctor, but she had let it happen. She had controlled all of time and space for several brief, wonderful moments, and she had let this happen. The Bad Wolf had let herself get trapped in an alternate universe.

And then, as a special form of self-punishment, the Bad Wolf led her to Norway, to have her heart broken on a windy beach. She could see him, for only two more minutes. She could not touch him, she could not get back to him, and they had left so much unsaid. She had said she loved him, but it was so much more than that. She missed him like she would miss an amputated limb. She knew it was not healthy; their relationship was so codependent that they could barely be out of the same room as each other while they were on the TARDIS. This was different though, this was permanent separation. She would never see him again. Never hear his voice. Never feel safe and complete with his arms wrapped around her. She had cried for so long that she had collapsed on the beach and Mickey had carried her back to the jeep.

When Jackie and Pete brought her home, she drug herself to her room and desperately cried into the bed. She felt like she could not ever stop crying. She had fallen asleep crying and awoke to fresh tears. The next day she raged about her room, breaking a vase against the wall and screaming at the top of her lungs in frustration. Then she had become despondent. She would not eat; she would not leave her room other than to wander around the garden for a couple of hours only to return to her room for more screaming or more crying.

The one thing that pulled her out of her love sick stupor was a flyer in the mail from Cambridge University. It had been sitting on the table in the kitchen as she passed through from the garden. The bright red on the picture caught her eye and she picked it up without realizing what she was doing. It was a postcard for a production of a play and she stared at the glossy picture of a blonde twenty something girl with a red cloak pulled up around her head.

'Red Riding Hood. Performances on Friday and Saturday at 7 p.m. Come see the Bad Wolf.'

She fretted about the wording and the play for hours. She paced her room and talked herself into circles. Finally, she could not resist it. She grabbed her leather jacket and her keys. At the bottom of the stairs she ran into Pete who looked at her with raised eyebrows.

"Going out?" he asked quizzically.

"There's a play… I figured it would be good to get out of the house," responded Rose, looking down and then back up at Pete.

"Well take the Range Rover."

"Thanks," She slipped past him, eyes still down and her shoulders slumped. Rose barely acknowledged anything on the drive up to the campus. She parked on a side street near some shops that were closing for the evening about five blocks from the theatre. She stuffed her hands in her pockets and strode along the streets. She had never been to Cambridge in her own world, so she had no idea how closely the two parallel cities resembled each other. It was England regardless of the changes, so Rose figured it could not be too different.

She sat in the play alone, watching the familiar story unfold in front of her with disinterest. She was not sure what she had expected. Was there going to be an alien invasion in the theatre? Would the bad wolf really be a werewolf? It was all too normal. It was a normal play, about the same story she had heard a hundred times and no one died or even screamed in real horror the whole two hours.

When she left the theater, she berated herself for her own disappointment. No one died, or was maimed, or abducted, and she was disappointed. She was so wrapped in her thoughts she forgot to watch her steps. She bumped into a man and sent his book bag contents flying all over the pavement.

"Sorry, sorry!" she apologized, bending to retrieve them from the ground. The book in her left hand was about physics, 'Superstrings: A theory of everything?' the cover had a string passing through the eye of a needle, balanced on the top of the earth. The sight of the string piqued her interest, but the second book made her heart stop. 'Encyclopedia of Folktales and Fairy Tales' was a thick paperback with Red Riding Hood and a golden coated wolf taking up the entire cover. Sometimes, the universe decides to haul back and smack you right in the face to get your attention.

"Sorry again. That book about string theory looks fascinating; I've often thought that was the more realistic theory of the physical world," she said, handing the man his books. She studied him more closely, he was a middle aged man with salt and pepper hair and twinkling blue eyes. Rose didn't know why, maybe it was his happy eyes or the laugh lines, but she immediately felt drawn to him. It was quite possibly because he was now holding another reminder of the Bad Wolf, as well.

"Oh no, no worries," the man smiled at her widely. "I have been known to walk into lamp posts if I'm thinking about a particularly troublesome problem. Are you a physics student? Or just a string theory aficionado?"

"Neither," said Rose with a laugh, even as the familiar feelings of inadequacy bubbled up. "I didn't even take my A-Levels."

"Never too late to try something though! You can always reinvent yourself," the man said with a smile. Rose felt like she had been slapped by the universe a second time. "I'm Professor Ian Chesterton, I work in the physics department. Since you admired the book you can hold on to it if you like, it's an extra and I'd rather it went to you than sit on my shelf getting dusty. Maybe you are an aficionado in the making."

"Thanks. I'm Rose," she responded. The man shoved the rest of his things back into his bag and gave her a small wave.

Professor Chesterton strode off without another backward glance at Rose, who stared after him dumbly with the book held in her hand. She shook herself out of her stupor and started on her way back. The man was pleasant enough, but Rose was not sure if going to University was really ever in her plans. Granted she was only twenty, and had nothing better to do with her time. It started to rain half way through her long walk back to the auto so she dove into a coffee shop and while waiting for it to let up, opened the book.

'No science is more pretentious than physics, for the physicist lays claim to the whole universe as his subject matter.'

She decided then and there, in that first glimpse that she wanted to study physics. It described the Doctor, and the thing she missed and wanted to connect with more than anything was the Doctor. She had no idea how to go about it. She would need to take the A-Levels. She would have to study for them, and then apply. She had not even gone to secondary in this universe. She figured Pete would know what she would need to do. He had set up the fake documents for them; he would probably be able to figure out how to get her into University.

The next day she bounded down the stairs to breakfast with her mother, father, Mickey and Jake for the first time. Her mother was shocked, but no one commented, afraid to do something to scare the smile from her face. She sat down at the table and put a piece of toast on her plate before speaking to them.

"I want to study physics. At Cambridge. Pass the bacon."

Her proclamation was met with silence. Pete passed her the plate of bacon, looking at Jackie with confusion. Mickey looked incredulous.

"You want to… study…what?" Her mother questioned her cup of coffee still halfway between the table and her lips. Rose looked up at her and smiled brightly. Her mother was probably remembering having to fight with her to study during her primary days. Rose usually came home and dropped her books in a corner, ad infinitum. Well she had until she had stopped going completely because it was more important to take up with Jimmy Stone.

"I want to take my A-Levels, or whatever I need to do, and I want to study physics at Cambridge."

"I think we could arrange that," Pete said, nodding his head slowly. Rose smiled and breakfast resumed as normal. Jackie and Pete shared a look, but no one questioned her again.

It was if it there was a spell over the house and if anyone questioned her decision she might resume her melancholy moping in her bedroom. Even when she struggled through studying, applying, and worrying about her acceptance, no one questioned if it was the right decision. At least not to Rose. Rose who was single-minded in her obsession to finish her A-Levels. Single-minded in becoming a physicist. Mickey tried to get her to be more reasonable, but Jackie had slapped him so hard on the back of his head that he had not spoken about the whole decision at all. Pete worried about Rose, but he did not feel like he could make decisions for Rose, because she was not his daughter. He worried about her though and in bed one night, after Rose had found out that she had gotten the three A's she needed to apply, Pete probed Jackie about the abrupt decision and her change in attitude.

"Don't you say a thing, Pete! She's smiling again, and she gets out of bed. That's all that's important right now. I didn't think anything was going to help her get over the Doctor, and I wouldn't care if she wanted to join the circus so long as she was happy again."


	3. Over the River and Through the Woods

Chapter Three: Over the River and Through the Woods

A/N: I tried to find someone to brit pick this because of the university pieces I didn't know about, but couldn't find anyone who had time. So you get to deal with my very basic knowledge of the British University system and my own American experience. If you have thoughts about anything, give me a heads up and I'll try to fix it.

Rose was certain that Pete had made things move faster and easier for her in the admissions process, but she did not complain. She got enough A-Levels, and that was plenty of hard work for her to feel like she had proved herself. It would be almost a year that she had spent in Pete's world when she moved into her flat in Cambridge and her mother tearfully told her she could come home anytime, or move back if she was so inclined. Rose had acknowledged the offers, but Jackie and Pete had eventually left her to start this new part of her life.

"And it's going to be fantastic," she told the sparsely furnished flat. She just wished she could feel certain about that.

-000-

She expected strange happenings because of all the 'Bad Wolf' messages, but it still made her stomach flip when she got her class list. Her first class on Monday morning: 'Physics 101: Professor Ian Chesterton'. The Professor smiled brightly when she walked in, recognizing her from all those months previous. Rose assumed the lecture was similar to most first lectures: they received the syllabus, everyone was told to read the intro chapter, and the class was dismissed after a brief overview of the first unit.

"Rose Tyler, could you come here please?"

The other students watched her with curiosity. Everyone knew her here. Her photo was splashed all over the gossip columns. Jackie Tyler, wife of wealthy business man turned head of Torchwood was supposedly dead and gone, but she returns with a girl that is unmistakably her daughter. The whole story had been great fodder. Ironic, that she had sometimes wished to be seen like this in her own world, especially in her younger teen years. But now, having been ripped apart and trying to put herself back together, she just wanted to be invisible.

Some students slowed down, trying to catch what the Professor was going to say to her as she slowly packed her notebook into her backpack to look over later. Ian just raised an eyebrow at them, and did not speak until the last student walked out the door.

"I can't tell you how pleased I am that you are here. I saw the name on the class list, but I wasn't sure if it was you. I'd like to think I had something to do with you being here, and you should go with it so my ego doesn't deflate."

Rose laughed, "It's actually not far off. I had never really thought about going to University. I was kind of... lost, when I ran into you, I didn't really have a plan for what I was going to do with the rest of my life."

"Like I said, it is never too late!" Professor Chesterton said with a happy grin. Rose could not help but beam back at his enthusiasm. "If you ever have questions or problems, even if it's not about this class, just stop by my office."

"I will definitely do that," said Rose with a nod, before she turned and walked out of the lecture hall to her next class.

-000-

Rose realized in the first couple of months of classes that without the distraction of Jimmy Stone, she was much better at succeeding academically. Sometimes, she wondered if it came from traveling with the Doctor. She was better about concentrating on the Professors and even with reading her textbooks. Sometimes knowledge she didn't know she had floated up in the middle of a lab, or in a lecture and she found herself raising her hand before she had a chance to think much about it. Maybe it was observation, or osmosis, but she was able to recite and apply complicated theories of physics and engineering without difficulty.

The entire physics department was baffled by her. She sometimes struggled with very basic material and breezed through the complex. Rose figured they all just assumed she was one of those people who were brilliant, but could not tie their own shoes. She did not feel like correcting them. Instead, she studied for hours on end and asked question after stupid question, determined to make an actual go at this life.

Her fellow classmates were intimidated by her and at first she worried that she would be treated as a leper. During a lab in the first week everyone paired up and she was left by herself (something she had never had happen in her previous life). Rose had been looked down on for being poor, but she had always had lots of mates.

Standing there by her desk by herself, she steeled herself and made a decision to make friends. It was a strange thought, and she was not sure how, but she figured she had tried to make friends with a Dalek, she could make friends with some university students who thought she was some crazy smart, rich girl.

By mid term she had ingratiated herself to a couple of people who seemed able to ignore her sometimes more eccentric qualities. She had even been invited to study groups and parties. She tended to go out of necessity, to keep up relations, more than a desire to socialize. Her one real desire was to study complicated theories to get glimpses at her life with the Doctor.

One of the few friendships she did not have to pour effort into was with Professor Chesterton. She went to him for help tying her advanced knowledge to the basic concepts and practices. He never judged her when she struggled through basics like vectors and Newton's second law. He just explained to her (in as many different ways as it took), even writing all over the white board on the wall in his office. His enthusiasm calmed Rose when she felt the frustration bubbling up inside of her.

-000-

"It's all about circular motions," explained Ian on a rainy day at the end of November, drawing a diagram on the board while Rose watched intensely. "There's a constant speed, but the velocity-"

A knock on the partially opened door, made both Rose and Ian jump in surprise. A middle aged brunette woman stood waiting in the doorway looking at Ian expectantly.

"Oh! Barbara! I'm sorry, love. I forgot about lunch," rambled Ian, scrambling to put his coat on and patting himself to find his wallet. "Sorry Rose, we'll have to talk about this another time. The reading from chapter four should be relatively helpful in explaining."

"If you're in the middle of something we can do lunch another day," said Barbara and Rose looked up from packing her notebook into her messenger bag.

"Oh no, don't change your plans. I've taken too much of Professor Chesterton's time anyway." 

"Hardly, it's why I'm here," responded Ian with a shake of his head at Rose. 

"You could come with us if you like," Barbara offered, looking to Ian with a shrug. "I'd be happy to have someone who understands half of what he's saying."

"I wouldn't want to impose," replied Rose, shrugging into her jacket. "I should actually spend some time reading for my lit class anyway. I don't understand a word written in the Inferno and I have a paper due about it next week."

"Oh, Professor Gold's class. Yes, well his course material can be a bit... Dense," said Barbara with a grimous.

"So sorry, I should have... Rose Tyler, meet my wife Barbara. Barbara, this is Rose Tyler!" said Ian, finally into his jacket with his wallet and his keys in his hands. "Bartbra is actually a Professor of English and History. She's brilliant!"

Rose felt as if Ian had socked her in the stomach with his comment. Ian and Barbara were too busy smiling at each other to notice Rose's momentary discomfort. The intonation had been the same even though Ian's voice was nothing like the Doctor's. She took a deep, steadying breath, forcing herself to forget about the Doctor, or being brilliant or fantastic.

"Really though, Rose, you should come with us. Ian's talked so much about you, I feel like I know you. I can even give you some help with the Inferno," offered Barbara smiling down at the blonde.

"If you're sure," said Rose slowly, looking at Barbara carefully. The older woman smiled at her and shrugged.

"We've been married for 25 years, there's been a lot of lunches with just the two of us."

Rose was not sure how, but going to lunch, led to stopping by for Sunday dinner once a month, and popping into Barbara's office for a chat or a question about her English and History classes. She supposed it had all started with that book that Ian had carried the first time she had met him. The same book prominently displayed in Barbara's office. The large volume with the bright red cape and the golden wolf.

-000-

"So, is there a guy in your life, Rose?" asked Barbara, as the two of them walked to lunch on a sunny March afternoon. Rose had dodged this question with people her own age several times, but it felt wrong giving the same noncommittal answer to Barbara.

"There was... he... it's a very complicated story, but we were traveling together. We went all over and he showed me so many amazing and terrible things, but... there was... well during the cybermen, we got separated."

"Oh..." said Barbara, giving her a sympathetic look. Rose realized her mistake.

"No, no. He's not dead. He... he helped get rid of them and ended up, well... we just couldn't get back to each other. We spoke one last time, but I haven't seen him in over a year," Rose trailed off, watching her feet hitting the pavement and avoiding Barbara's eyes.

"Can't you get back to him? Or... him to you?"

"No," said Rose firmly. "It would be too dangerous. I've thought about it, but... it's not worth what might happen."

Barbara changed the subject to something more neutral, but Rose was no longer paying attention. It was dangerous. Too dangerous. That was the mantra she kept up in her head so that she would not go insane. Or think of her own way to rip open the void. The hair on the back of her neck stood on end and she turned her head to look behind her.

A woman in a white suit and pearls was standing across the road staring directly at her. She furrowed her brows, she was about to cross the street, but a van drove by and when it had passed the woman was gone.

"Rose? Are you coming?" Barbara asked, standing in the doorway of the cafe. Rose shook her head to clear it of the fog that had encompassed her. She gazed up and down the street one more time before turning back to Barbara.

"Yeah, sorry. I think I need to eat something, I might be going barmy."


	4. Delirious

**Delirious new adventures**

**A/N: Thanks to all the people who have shown interest in this story. It's one of those stories that keeps pulling me in so I have a lot of chapters/future parts written, but it's a long and complicated story so it's going to be sporadic updating for the time being. And for those of you who read Filius it is on a hiatus until I can get back to it. I shouldn't have even posted it as it is right now and I might pull it, but it will be replaced at some point. **

**Anyway, enjoy the latest chapter. Please read and review and let me know what you like/don't like. I'm all for criticism to help me grow as a writer. Thanks!**

The world started to fall apart around exam time at the end of Rose's first year. She had gotten up early and trudged across campus with determination. She managed to stay attached to the table she had commandeered for the entire day, though on several occasions she had felt an ache in her body. She wanted more than anything to jump on a plane to anywhere, and had even imagined she heard the TARDIS in one her more delirious moments. She was exiting the library, loaded down with books, and eyes blurry from an entire day of studying.

Her whole body relaxed as she stepped out of the doors. She breathed in the night air and looked up. Even with the light pollution the stars twinkled back at her distant and blurry. That was a constant through the adventures with the Doctor, there were stars in similar patterns around the universe, all twinkling over her head. A bright flash spread across the sky, traveling quickly and within the atmosphere. It lit up the sky in a greenish blue glow and she followed it with her eyes. She juggled her physics book to her other arm as she patted jacket pockets for her cell phone.

"Hello?" Mickey's voice came from the other end.

"Mickey, does Torchwood know about the meteor that just fell?" she asked without preamble. Mickey sighed.

"First time you call in two weeks, and this is what you call about. They're trackin' it right now."

Rose watched it carefully as it flew west, growing brighter and larger until it vanished from her eyesight beyond the edge of town.

Mickey groaned, "What is it with you and alien stuff? Whatever it was it's headed for a field outside Cambridge."

Rose laughed, running across campus to her Range Rover, "I'm just jeopardy friendly. Send me the impact point, and I'll see you lot out there."

She tossed her books and back pack into the passenger seat and put the coordinates into her Sat Nav. She wove in and out of traffic, exiting the small city and entering the countryside well ahead of Torchwood.

She found the field easily and could see, even from the road with nothing but starlight, the massive crater and the smoke billowing out. She pulled down the farm lane and parked on the grass. She pulled on her earpiece communicator and touched it.

"Mickey, are you there?"

"Yeah, what is it?"

"Well...it's a giant crater in a corn field. But I'm going to get closer and have a look," replied Rose as she scanned the surrounding area. The ground was uneven and the previous days rain had made the field a muddy mess. "I'm gonna need new trainers after this."

"Like you can't afford them now," was Mickey's half-hearted reply.

"Oi! I'm near the edge now, so far nothing."

"Right. Just be careful, our E.T.A. is only five minutes. Just stay out of trouble for five minutes."

Rose laughed, "Do my best."

Rose turned off her comm and stepped closer to the edge. In the bottom of the pit, partially obscured by soil, was a massive lump of blue tinted rock. Rose slowly picked her way closer, slowly sliding down into the hole.

"I'm so glad you're here."

Rose whipped around and gaped at the woman standing behind her in the field.

"You! Have you been following me?" Rose asked indignantly, watching the woman with suspicion. She was wearing the same white suit and pearls. Justified or not, Rose was certain there was something wrong with a woman who was able walk into a field and still have perfectly white pumps on her feet.

"You could say that," the woman responded smiling down at her. "You are going to have a choice, Rose Tyler. Someone has been ripping holes in the universe and this is just the start of it. You have to start preparing."

"Preparing for what? What's ripping holes in the Universe?" asked Rose, but the woman shook her head.

"It's not time. You just need to start preparing for what's coming."

Rose gave her an exasperated sigh, "What's coming?

"The end of the world. By the way, the stars are going out," the woman said, and Rose's head snapped backwards to look at the sky the stars were shining brightly above her. The sounds of the Torchwood team bursting onto the scene caught her attention and she looked over the edge of the crater to see the portable lab bus and several black SUVs. When she turned back, the woman had vanished.

"Glad you haven't been abducted or turned into some strange creature," called Mickey as he pulled a case from his truck and Jake followed with his laptop. It took minutes for the twenty person team to assemble a field base and start scanning the area around the impact site. In the back of her mind, Rose kept wondering about who the strange woman was, but the bustle of the excavation team drew her attention. The team stepped down into the pit and started taking measurements, and samples from around the stone.

"Seen anything like it before?" Mickey asked Rose as they stood above the group of scientists in the pit.

"Nope. Granted, I might have run right by it, and never even noticed," responded Rose, she looked up at the sky again to make sure that the stars were still visible. Mickey followed her gaze.

"Somethin' wrong?"

"Hmm...No," responded Rose absently, frowning up at the stars.

"Miss Tyler, you might want to come down here," a man in a lab coat called up to her. She started down to him and he rose from his squatted position and pointed. "We've only seen one other sample like this and it was in the wreckage after Canary Wharf."

Rose bent down and studied the rock closely. It was a solid chunk and looked like a milky Sapphire, "Has it been classified?"

"Yes Ma'am. It's adamantium. It's an alien metal that cannot be penetrated by anything. We broke over a dozen drills trying to take samples of the last one. And from what I can tell without moving the dirt, it's perfectly square," the man was looking at the rock with a mixture of curiosity and wariness.

"Get it back to the lab. See what you can find out about it," said Rose with authority. She had not spent much time at Torchwood since starting university, but being the boss' daughter had it's perks. The man nodded. The team moved quickly, gathering the rock and the soil samples into the trucks and pealing out back to the lab. Mickey was waiting for her, leaning against her car.

"Why didn't you go back with Jake?" asked Rose, wiping dirt from her hands onto her jeans. She knew exactly what he was waiting to say to her.

"You haven't been calling. Or stopping in. We're worried about you," said Mickey, opening up the passenger side door and stepping into her truck. She put up her defenses and got into the driver's side. She pulled back onto the road heading towards London trying to gather her thoughts and come up with plausible excuses. They drove for several moments before Mickey spoke again.

"Your mum is trying to put on a brave face, but with everythin' that's happened... She doesn't want to see you mopin' about for the Doctor, but this isn't exactly a good change either, Rose."

Rose sighed, "I've just been busy. I'm sorry I haven't been checkin' in. It's just that classes are a lot of work. You know what I'm like about school, it's hard changing my habits. I have to work twice as hard."

"That's not it... it's... we're best mates, right?"

Rose looked over at him to see him studying her carefully. When she turned her eyes back to the road, she nearly screamed. Only a couple of meters in front of her was a large grey wolf, standing in the middle of the road and staring at the oncoming car. Rose slammed on the breaks and the tires squealed in protest. The wolf took off across the road, into the countryside.

"You alright? Mickey?" she asked, looking over to her friend who was staring wide eyed out the window in the direction the wolf had disappeared.

"I'm fine. Was that a wolf? An honest to god wolf?"

"Yeah, I think it was," said Rose, unbuckling her seat belt. Mickey gripped her arm and she looked at him with exasperation. "What?"

"You can't go out there."

"Mickey, it ran off. Besides they're more afraid of us than we are of them," said Rose, pulling her arm away from him and getting out of the truck. She grabbed the torch in her back seat and followed the path the wolf had taken into the tall grass in the ditch. She shown the light back and forth, but there was not a single sign of where the wolf had gone. Giving up, she turned back to the road when she heard a loud howling that caused her to stop dead and the hair on the back of her neck to stand on end.

"Rose!" called Mickey, stepping out of the car with his gun drawn. Rose ignored him and slowly rotated back. There, just beyond a low stone wall, were the glowing eyes of the wolf.

"Hello love," Rose exhaled, her body tense as they studied each other.

The wolf yipped to her. She smiled and stepped closer to the wall, hearing Mickey's sharp intake of breathe behind her. It watched her warily and she took slow, halting steps forward, but when she reached the wall she heard another howling to her right and stopped abruptly. Squinting into the dark of the night she saw another, larger, wolf come lumbering forward. It stopped when it caught her scent and looked from her to the first wolf.

"ROSE!" came Mickey's nearly frantic voice. The two wolves bolted further into the pasture, yipping back and forth, and disappeared into the night. Rose stared after them wistfully, until Mickey came down and hauled her back up to the road.

"What's your problem?" asked Mickey, but Rose knew he was more shaken than angry. "They could've attacked you!"

"I told you, they were scared. They wouldn't have done anything."

Mickey watched her closely and she tried to hide the smile on her face, but she couldn't stop. Mickey shook his head.

"There's something wrong with you, you know that?"

"Jeopardy friendly, that's all," replied Rose smiling brightly at him again. "They were just looking for each other. They're probably the only two wolves this far south. They're a pack."

"A pack is more than two," Mickey pointed out.

"You're right, they're just a pair, but they still seem happy to have found each other."

Mickey shook his head at her as they crawled back into the truck. Rose felt light, but Mickey's constant, concerned looks were causing the heaviness to return. Could the Bad Wolf use more than words across the universe? What were the chances that she had been the one to happen upon them? There was little, Rose knew, that was coincidental when it came to her life.

-000-

Rose spent all night at Torchwood while they ran tests on the Adamantium. Doctor Grant (the one from the crash site) was the lead scientist on the find and they conferred over the course of action on the piece until they were doing nothing, but running in circles.

Just hours before dawn, he found Rose making a cup of tea in the break room and literally bounced on the balls of his feet waiting for her to finish and turn to him.

"Did you find something?" asked Rose smiling at his antics. He was an attractive older man, but he was childlike in his wonder about the find. Rose felt like everyone she met managed to remind her of the Doctor.

"Yes, well... sort of. We found out several interesting properties," explained Doctor Grant. "It's magnetic. Highly magnetic. And it's causing all sorts of strange things with our instruments. We still haven't found any possible way to break it."

"Anything else?" asked Rose, as Doctor Grant looked at her with the excitement of a child on Christmas morning. His green eyes were dilated and shining and his face was flushed.

"I think it might have something inside it. There's a... well come see."

Rose followed Doctor Grant into the laboratory where two younger scientists were working at computers. They both watched Rose with curiosity, which Rose ignored. She stepped forward to look at the clean shining hunk of rock on the sterile bench. It gleamed in the light of the lab and cast everything around it with a blue tinge as if it were radiating light.

It was a large piece, but no bigger than a beach ball . She studied it carefully, running her hands over the spot that Doctor Grant was so excited about. On the top, just barely visible was an indentation in a perfect circle.

"If there were a... being... inside, you'd think they would have made themselves known by now," said Doctor Grant, watching the stone eagerly as if he had said the words to make a tiny Martian pop out of the stone. Rose shook her head, she circled the table and ran her hands all over the piece. It was a perfectly smooth, except for the circle.

"Is there anything on the bottom?" asked Rose, curious to run her hands over that part as well. Doctor Grant motioned to his assistants and they turned on a robotic claw above the table and flipped the piece on it's side so Rose could look at the top and bottom at the same time.

'It's a square, there isn't a top and bottom,' she thought to herself, but she was distracted as her hands ran over another small indentation. She looked closely at the bottom, but the stone looked perfectly smooth. She ran her fingers over it lightly again.

"Doctor Grant, can you feel this?"

He stepped forward and put his hand right where Rose had previously had hers. He furrowed his brow and looked down at the piece, squinting at the stone.

"There's... it feels like there's something there, but it's not... there's visibly nothing different. We'll put it into the sonic imaging and see what we can find. It will probably take about a couple of hours."

Rose nodded in understanding, "I'll be back in later, just call me if you find anything before then."

Doctor Grant nodded and Rose paused, she had not taken her eyes off the piece of stone. A large yawn, she could not control made her break eye contact and she forced her feet to move toward the exit.

Her mind was buzzing with the events of the evening, but she could not get herself to follow one line of thought for long. She drove to the mansion because it was closer, and slept walked up the main steps to her bedroom. She collapsed, fully clothed, onto her comforter and groaned. The bed felt heavenly for the first time ever. She had always dreaded sleeping in this room, but now she let the soft, and dead quiet take her away.


	5. Domestics

A/N: I didn't really like this chapter, but I hope you all do. The next chapter will be up shortly and the little threads I'm weaving will all start to move together soon, but for now: you'll all be waiting and wondering how Rose ends up in the library.

Disclaimer: I don't own Doctor Who.

The Domestics:

"Rose, do you want some breakfast?" her mother's voice cut through the fog of her sleep and she looked up with her mouth open and her eyes unfocused. She could tell she had been drooling, but she was to exhausted to care.

"Mmm... banana pancakes," she mumbled, before letting her head fall back onto the pillow.

"Well it won't take long, you should get up and shower. Pete said he'll wait for you and you can go in together," her mother said, picking up Rose's muddy trainers from the floor. Rose rolled over to face the ceiling and blinked several times at the morning sunshine filtering into her room.

"Right. Do I have any clothes here?"

Her mother opened her mouth, eyes flashing with exasperation and concern, but she pursed her lips instead and nodded, "In your dresser. From when we went shopping, at Christmas time?"

"Oh right," Rose said, rolling out of the bed. She pulled out a pair of jeans and a long sleeve t-shirt, they both still had the tags on them. She winced at the site of them. They had always gone shopping together and they had not done it since Christmas, and she hadn't even worn the clothes. She knew that it was as good as returning a present in Jackie's eyes. She could feel her mother's eyes on her as she moved about the room and finally she steeled herself to look at her.

Worry was etched across Jackie's face. Rose bit her lip and said, "I'm sorry I haven't been around much, Mum. And I'm sorry I haven't called. I just... it was so hard for a while. I just needed to focus on classes for a bit. Get my footing."

Jackie's body relaxed and she held out her arms. Rose stepped into her mother's embrace and nearly cried at the familiar feeling. She wanted to tell her mother how being around them made her think about the Doctor, and the time she had been able to get back to him with their help. That she couldn't figure out a way to get back this time and it killed her to even contemplate it. That she didn't blame Pete, but sometimes she wished he had let her fall into the void. That in her flat, with Ian and Barbara, and absorbed in classes she could pretend to be someone else. Someone who was not trapped in a world that she despised.

Jackie pulled back and Rose smiled brightly. Her mother studied her face carefully, but Rose kept the smile until Jackie seemed satisfied, and left the room. Immediately, her smile dropped and she trudged into the shower to try and push the feelings and thoughts deep into herself. She had always carried her heart on her sleeve and been vocal about her feelings. She felt emotions so strongly, but she couldn't continue living if she let herself feel all the things she had felt since collapsing on the beach in Norway.

She cried as the water ran down her and she stood with her cheek against the wall until she had managed to control the turmoil inside of her body. She let out a long breathe and stepped out, dressing quickly and brushing the tangles out of her hair with more vehemence than was strictly necessary.

When she arrived down in the kitchen, she had managed to pull herself together and covered the rest with makeup. Pete and Jackie were sitting at the table talking quietly, sharing small, happy smiles. They stopped abruptly, looking guilty, when she walked in.

"Morning" she called to them, grabbing a mug and pouring herself a large cup of coffee and throwing in a sugar cube and some milk. She looked up to see her parents exchanging a look. "Something you want to share?"

They both looked at her and then back to each other, like guilty teenagers. Rose laughed, relief flooding through her. It was nice to properly laugh, to actually feel like she had a reason to laugh. The constant gnawing in her stomach, that was always present around reminders of her old life, eased as well.

She slid into the seat across from her mother and looked at her expectantly, "Well if you aren't going to share. That meteor they hauled in last night is Adamantium, and it was crafted by someone or something. It's perfectly square. Doctor Grant is doing a sonic visioning or somethin' like that on it."

"Adamantium? That's strange," said Pete, his brow furrowing. Jackie took his hand, squeezing her reassurance. Pete became distracted by her touch and they smiled stupidly at each other again.

"And Mickey and I almost hit a wolf on our way back from the crash site," said Rose, taking a sip of her coffee and avoiding her mother's concerned glance. Rose was not sure what Mickey had told her about the 'Bad Wolf' messages, but from her mother's strained expression it was more than Rose wanted her to know.

"That's very strange. There are hardly any wolves in Britain at all, let alone this far south," responded Pete. He was curious about the abnormal sighting, but he had no clue about the implications that Jackie seemed to. "Did it want your basket of goodies?"

Pete chuckled at his joke, but Jackie narrowed her eyes at Rose in question and Rose shook her head, her smile strained. The gnawing had increased again and she really wanted nothing more than to leave the house and her mother's intense gaze. She kept hoping the Bad Wolf signs were leading her to the Doctor, but Jackie's concern was crushing the small hope the words stoked in her heart.

"We have something to tell you, before you and I leave," Pete said abruptly and Jackie looked at him with shock. Rose expectantly waited as they stared at each other again. She sighed, as much as she liked to see them together, and to let herself think about this happy couple her parents made, it was starting to wear on her exhausted nerves.

"Come on then, spill."

"Pete and I are... well... we're havin' a baby. You are going to be a big sister," said Jackie, her grin spreading, uncontrollably. Rose's jaw dropped, then she started laughing hysterically.

"I always wanted a sibling," she said, once she could control her laughing. She jumped up and hugged her mother tightly. "I'm so happy for you!"

-000-

As they drove away from the house after a happy breakfast discussing names and a baby shower, Rose realized her gushing was not put on. She was happy for them. Ecstatic even, that one of the things she knew her mother had always hoped for was happening. The gnawing was completely gone as she chatted happily with Pete about how her semester was going.

"I'm going to need to head back tonight. I have exams starting tomorrow and I lost a lot of study time with this whole thing," said Rose, but she was intrigued by the discovery and pushed the thoughts of exams out of her mind as they pulled into the Torchwood Tower.

"Your mum and I thought it might be nice if you stayed for dinner tonight, but school is important, so if you can't we'll understand."

"We'll see."

She realized with another pang that her avoidance had caused her family concern. She kicked herself, but she knew she wouldn't have changed anything if she had known. She had been hurting too badly to think about anyone else outside of her own pain and depression.

Doctor Grant met them at the entrance, holding his hands together and bouncing on the balls of his feet again. Rose smiled at him and tried to hide her amusement.

"Did you find anything, Dr. Grant?" Pete asked, watching the scientist curiously. Rose could tell he was trying hard to keep from laughing. Doctor Grant was oblivious to their amusement, and motioned for them to follow him and started speaking rapidly.

"There are two imperfections on the stone, one is a small circle indent, visible to the eye, and might come out, or sink in. We haven't been able to determine that. But," here he turned and looked at Rose. "The strange mark you felt last night has been revealed by the imaging. It's symbols. They were so small the imaging had to be done twice to capture them well enough to view."

They arrived in the lab, the rock still casting it's blue tint on it's surroundings. Rose watched it closely as Doctor Grant led them to his desk where a haphazard pile of photos was taking up part of the desk. He picked them up and handed them to Rose proudly.

She frowned as she looked over the blown up images. She had seen the writing before, on one of the worst days of her life. Looking at the them, she could even imagine the black hole above her head.

"I've seen this before. No one knew what it said, the TARDIS couldn't even translate it, and the TARDIS can translate anything," explained Rose to Pete with Doctor Grant hovering anxiously.

"But we translated it!" Doctor Grant cried enthusiastically.

"What?" Rose's head snapped to him. He beamed at her.

"We found writing like this before, spent ages working on it. There were these papers covered in them in one of the offices in Torchwood, after the cybermen. We brought in a linguistics specialist. Best in the world, she only spent three months working on them. It was just a code, it's symbols that represent the English Alphabet."

"What does it say?" Rose snapped, losing her patience. The words on the paper were making her increasingly uncomfortable and edgy.

"End of time."

-000-

Rose had sat with one of the language researcher for hours trying to remember as many of the symbols, in the exact sequence they had been written, from the impossible planet. Anna, the lone researcher in the department, was only a couple of years older than Rose and was more than happy to share her small closet of an office. After working together for some time, they agreed that the language she remembered and the one they had unearthed were not the same. The symbols were identical, but the one's written on the wall in 'Hell', were gibberish when they tried to translate them.

"What is it, then?" asked Mickey when he popped into the office with a pizza. He set the pizza down on the desk and took a place across from Rose.

"I have a theory," said Anna, the bookish blond pipped up. Mickey looked at her for the first time and she blushed lightly before hurriedly continuing. "It's a code. It's completely different from what Rose found. Unless the civilization that Rose was telling me about had a thing for space monkeys."

"Space monkeys?" asked Mickey, looking incredulously at Anna and Rose. Anna shrugged and pointed to the white board. The symbols were written out and below them were the English translation.

"Space druhal Monkeys," Rose read in between bites of pizza. Mickey shook his head.

"Plus, there are symbols that weren't in the one that Doctor Lynch translated," cut in Anna again. She shook her head. "I don't really understand why someone would use these symbols for code though. It wasn't a particularly hard job for Doctor Lynch to figure out what the language was when she was here."

"What I want to know is how a language, that was dead long before we got to the 51st century and a solar system away, ended up here," added Rose. Mickey frowned at her and then looked back at the white board. Rose could tell he was warring with himself over something. Rose arched an eyebrow at him, until he noticed her expectant expression. He frowned again.

"It could... well... if it's something that came from well... from when you were with the Doctor," started Mickey, uncomfortably. "Could it be from him? I mean, it's a strange message. 'End of time'. Seems like the type of thing he would be wrapped up in."

Rose snorted, "You think I hadn't already thought of that? That it wasn't my first thought? "

Mickey glared at her and Anna shifted uncomfortably in her peripheral. Rose looked down at the pizza, and tried to conjure up the guilt that she should have felt for being so rude to her best friend. She forced herself to look apologetic and brought her gaze back up to meet his and he forgave her instantly. She felt even worse inside. Her stomach clenched uncomfortably and she bit the inside of her cheek to keep from grimacing.

"If you want to head back to your flat, I can take you to your mum's," Mickey offered, licking the grease off his fingers. Rose rolled her eyes and handed him a napkin.

"That'd be great. I'm going to fail my exam tomorrow if I don't get some more studying done. I just have to run up to talk to Pete," she said, standing and stretching. She gathered her stack of paper and shoved it into the file folder with the report on the Adamantium. Mickey closed the pizza box, moving especially slowly, and glancing at Anna who had moved back in front of the white board and was staring intently at the symbols.

"I'll meet you at my truck," said Mickey, looking at Rose pointedly. Rose looked at him innocently and smiled.

"Don't you want to come with me?"

Mickey glared at her in exasperation and she stuck her tongue out in amusement. She smiled at Anna who had missed the whole exchange.

"Bye Anna, thanks for all your help!"

Anna turned to look at her and smiled back, "If I find anything, you'll be the first to hear. Would you ask Mr. Tyler if he got a hold of Doctor Lynch?"

"I'll ask him," Rose said and gave Mickey another cheeky grin before exiting the office. She was only just on the other side of the door when she heard Mickey ask Anna if she fancied going to the Van Gogh exhibit on Friday. Rose shook her head. Mickey was getting more perceptive if he realized that Anna had been giving him eyes, or he had been wanting to ask Anna out much longer than Rose knew.

That thought bugged her, because she didn't know the answer. Maybe Mickey had been pinning for the girl for months and she hadn't even known, and hadn't thought to ask. She sighed, she had been doing such a good job of avoiding her family, and now it was coming back to make her feel wretched about herself.

'After exams, I'll make a point to be around more. After exams,' she told herself with a fierce tone.

-000-

"Come in," Pete said when she knocked on his office door. His office still impressed her. After the Cybermen, Pete had taken over as head of Torchwood and put aside Vitex to help protect the earth and clean up the mess that had been left behind. Being the head honcho meant he got the premier office, top of the high rise with a wide view of London spread out before them, the sun streaming in and lighting up the entire room on an abnormally sunny spring day.

Pete was staring intently at a piece of paper in his hand and moving his lips as he read. He looked up, saw Rose, and smiled brightly. Rose felt the guilt bubble up again. "Rose, you don't need to knock. You're always welcome in here."

"I'll remember that next time. Mickey's going to take me back to the house so I can get going. I wanted to stick around for dinner, but I don't know that I'll get much studying done. I'll be back home right after exams though."

Pete nodded in understanding, "That's fine. It was nice to get to see you at all."

He paused and looked uncertain. Everyone seemed to be worrying about her and what they said to her lately. Well, not lately, since Bad Wolf Bay. "I know I'm not your Dad, but I love having you around and I know your Mum misses you quite a bit."

Rose swallowed and nodded, "I know. I promise, after exams I'll be here more often."

"That was something else I wanted to ask you about," continued Pete, smiling at her. "How would you like to come back and work for Torchwood again, during the holiday. We could really use your expertise on a couple of projects."

"Yeah, I could do that, I s'pose," Rose responded. She smiled, ignoring the guilt and the pain in her stomach. She could digest all of her feelings and thoughts after she had taken her exams. Pete nodded and smile back at her.

"Good. And good luck on your exams. Your Mum and I are really proud of you, you know."

Rose bit her lip, trying not to cry. Pete rose from the desk and had her wrapped in his arms without hesitation. Rose cried silently for several moments while Pete held her in the middle of his massive office, overlooking London, in the top of Torchwood. Everything was so wrong here, but Rose could not help feeling like this was worth everything that she had been put through in the last year. Having a chance to be wrapped up in her father's arms and have a baby sister or brother on the way, it was nearly worth losing the Doctor.


End file.
